


words stay, once said

by timeladyleo



Category: Cabin Pressure
Genre: Angst with a Hopeful Ending, F/M, Fandot Secret Santa
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-10-13 10:02:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17486072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/timeladyleo/pseuds/timeladyleo
Summary: Carolyn sits and thinks about things, the way they were.For the prompt 'we drift away', for Annabelthegreat, for the 2018 secret santa!





	words stay, once said

**Author's Note:**

  * For [annabelthegreat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/annabelthegreat/gifts).



> This is yet another au of Zurich, in which Herc goes but Martin doesn't. Don't think about the timelines too hard. I didn't. 
> 
> I hope it suffices, and that your year is brilliant!

Though the coffee was hot, the ambient temperature of the room was enough to stop steam spiralling off into nothing. She hadn’t turned the radio on earlier so an empty silence filled every crack in the room, pressing down into her like the air had gained weight. Arthur would be home soon. He had taken Snoopadoop out this morning for a change, wrapping his huge red scarf around himself three or four times. Carolyn had smiled to watch him waddle off into the grey November morning. 

And then she had been alone. This was always the worst month, just before Christmas so Arthur wasn’t enough of a distraction from the cold, but too long after summer for any warmth to remain. Even the bluest days in November were crisp and sharp, the sun deceptive as even it couldn’t melt the frozen daggers of grass. 

She turned her phone over on the table. No messages. No calls. Her work phone always wanted something from her, but these days her personal phone was too often silent. Was it her fault? She rather suspected it was.

09:37. Arthur was likely to be out until at least ten. He’d be taking the dog out to the lake on the far side of the park. He always did. So many times Snoopadoop had come back sopping wet, dragging a trail of moisture and filth through the house as she slipped away from Arthur like an eel. Somehow, she seemed to be able to get into the linen cupboard without fail. Carolyn had never gotten around to installing a lock on that door. Even the cleverest dog didn’t have opposable thumbs. And Snoopadoop had about as many brain cells as a starfish. 

_Ridiculous dog_. The words came to Carolyn unbidden. They were softer than what Carolyn usually said to Snoop, but they brought to mind the image of someone she was trying to forget. After all, he had forgotten her first. Her hands tightened around her mug, the heat digging in to her fingertips. She ignored it. 

Not that Arthur would ever know, but tomorrow would mark a year since she last picked up Herc’s call. He had really tried, after he’d moved to Zurich, he’d called her at least twice a week and told her long stories about his trips. She didn’t believe they were all true, but for a while it had just been nice. Nice to hear his voice, nice to be able to tell him about what nonsense Martin and Douglas had been up to with her plane. 

Part of her still thought she should have made Martin go to Swiss Air. The poor boy cheated himself out of a good job for some delusion of loyalty. In a way, it was admirable. At least he was earning something now, and just as well after the whole debacle with the van. He’d invited them all over to his new flat for dinner not long after he’d moved in. Theresa had proposed that night, just after Martin had presented his own recipe apple crumble. Carolyn to this day wasn’t sure what more to an apple crumble he could have done than just apples and crumble, but it had been delicious. 

At that moment they had been happy. All of them had been there, and it had been easy. They hadn’t had to think about conversation, they hadn’t had to pretend to smile at Martin turning deep red and almost dropping his pudding, or wanted to look away when they kissed. It was just friends sharing their time together. 

Time, before things changed too much to go back. 

Carolyn had pretended not to notice Herc’s glances to her in between congratulations. She was sure that he was regretting not asking her the question. He’d have regretted asking more, because she couldn’t be sure she’d have said yes. 

Should she have said yes? The silence in the kitchen was unbearable. She got up to turn on the radio, some generic classical station. A woman’s voice warbled through the speakers, climbing a scale in that grandiose way sopranos were wont to do. Damn. The last thing Carolyn wanted to hear was opera right now.

In an attempt to pretend that he wasn’t leaving, Carolyn had let him stay in the house through the whole week before. He had half moved in there anyway. Three days before he left, he sprung theatre tickets on her. He’d told her nothing more than the fact that they were going. It turned out to be a production at the Fitton Civic, by the amateur operatic society who had an interesting cast of people working for them. 

As expected, the performance had been average if you were being nice. The Figaro had been an alright actor, until he opened his mouth to sing. Carolyn had just been glad there was a lot of speaking in Mozart. Herc had cried at the end. She pretended not to understand why, after all, the play had not only been a comedy because it was written that way. They’d walked out of the theatre in almost silence, being rude about the actors and the singing only lasting to the car park. It had been half-hearted too. That was usually Carolyn’s favourite bit, ripping it to shreds. 

They’d not said much more that evening before bed either. Arthur had asked them all about it, and Herc was more than happy to oblige him, being overly generous to the quality of the performance. Carolyn had managed a few snide comments here and there. She was too busy trying to order her thoughts, to put them into neat boxes where she could shut the lids and leave them alone. Nothing she was doing seemed to be getting rid of the underlying dread. 

It was that dread that was back. Perhaps not exactly the word she wanted, but she couldn’t think of anything else to describe the physical ache lining her ribs, the sense that she had made a horrible mistake with the knowledge that she could do nothing to change it without going against every code she had ever held for herself. Maybe she _was_ going soft. 

“Mum, we’re home!” It had been twenty minutes already? She sipped at her coffee, curling her lip as she realised it was too cold to be nice. Snoopadoop launched into the kitchen, losing whatever grip she had had on the floor and skidded the whole length of the room, the cupboard under the sink breaking her slide. Carolyn got up and threw a towel over her. 

“Sorry, Mum! I’ve got it!” Arthur bounced in a moment later, launching himself to the floor to grab the dog in an attempt to dry her. Carolyn was just glad that it was damp out, not muddy. As Arthur sat back on his heels to start wiping the floor, he asked “How are you?”

Carolyn smiled at him. “Just the same as before you left, Arthur.”

That wasn’t exactly a lie. Arthur could usually see right through her biggest lies anyway. Damn him for being so emotionally sensitive! He certainly hadn’t got that from his parents. If he hadn’t been that way all through his life, she’d suspect that he’d picked it up from Herc. 

On Herc’s very last night, they had cooked a little farewell dinner together. Herc had been the leading force, thank goodness, but Arthur had some skill with a potato peeler and with the right guidance was pretty good at puddings. Carolyn had completely avoided the kitchen even before Herc had forbidden her from it to “avoid spoilers”. She’d been fake cross about it, and never quite managed to decide if he meant it or if he was helping her self-imposed ban, knowing that seeing the two of them getting on was breaking her heart.

The dinner itself, despite being 100% vegetarian, was delicious. In a rare moment of weakness, Carolyn admitted it and didn’t even comment on Herc’s smug face afterwards. If he’d been staying, she’d never have lived it down. If he’d been staying, she wouldn’t have said anything. Arthur was uncharacteristically quiet too, until he found the nerve to ask when Herc would be back.

Herc and Carolyn locked eyes for just a moment before Herc offered a weak “Soon, maybe. Hopefully.” Then he had smiled, but nothing could really hide the sadness behind his eyes, and Carolyn almost felt her mouth opening and the words asking him to stay coming out. She bit her tongue. No use in that feeling now. If she had wanted him to stay, she should have said so before the very last night together. She _should_ have said so. She knew that now. 

She’d known it that night too, as she lay awake listening to Herc breathing, knowing that her own stupid stubbornness was letting her give up the one person she’d ever trusted this much. Letting a man who acted more like Arthur’s father than Gordon ever had leave. 

And then he had been gone. 

And then he had called. 

And then the guilt had stopped her answering, and a whole year had gone by, somehow, and she could feel the last of her feelings slipping away from her. She’d always suspected that getting involved was a bad idea, yet she just had to go and prove it to herself again and again. How could this be worse than Gordon? Deep inside, she knew why. She had loved Herc. She still did. 

“Mum?” Carolyn was aware that he’d said her name a couple of times.

“Sorry, Arthur. What is it?” 

“This is for you. I picked it up when I came in.” He handed her a letter. “It’s Herc’s writing,” he said, his voice trembling a little with anticipation. 

Carolyn opened it, trying to hide her shaking hands. Her eyes blurred over the words, having to read each sentence several times. His writing was cursive and neat, as if he had used a typewriter with a setting for pretentiousness. But the words themselves were anything but, just simple and to the point, explaining what he was thinking as easily as if he were describing a play.

“What does it say?” Arthur asked. Snoopadoop was sitting on his lap now, both on the floor.

_I’ve reassessed my priorities over the last year, and I’ve realised that no job is worth enduring the long hours of loneliness I’ve felt recently. So, I have decided to retire, and move back home._

Carolyn breathed deeply as she read it again to make sure she understood properly. “He’s coming back to England, Arthur.” 

Arthur cheered at this, then his face fell. “He still remembers us, right? I mean obviously he does, but he wants to come back and see us, right?”

_I will understand if you don’t want to see me, but I would like to meet even just once, because I have missed you and Arthur. Not only do I miss my friends, and my old house, and speaking English rather than crude German, but I miss you._

Carolyn nodded. She didn’t trust herself to speak. “So he says.” 

“And… you want him to too, right?”

_And, if you’ll let me, I’d very much like to marry you. I still love you. I always have, and if you want me to, I always will._

“Yes, Arthur. I rather think I do.”

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on tumblr at [sircarolyn](sircarolyn.tumblr.com)!


End file.
